Clothes of Sand
Clothes of Sand is an audiobook produced by Big Finish Productions. It was released in July 2008. Back cover "The Sandman is coming... singing the children to sleep everywhere..." When Maggie Evans is take to the Windcliff Institute, she begins her recovery from the ordeal she suffered at the hands of Barnabas Collins. As she undergoes hypnosis, disturbing memories of her childhood being to surface. Who was the imaginary friend who once watched over her, and what threat does he prose for Maggie's future? Synopsis Teaser Maggie Evans remembers her mother’s words about The Sandman. A voice says The Sandman is coming. Having escaped from the clutches of Barnabas Collins, Maggie is found delirious on the beach by her father and is promptly taken to Windcliff Sanitarium in order to recover. Theme Maggie hears a voice inside her head. It is disappointed that Maggie has forgotten it. At Windcliff nurses give Maggie a wash, as she watches the sand spin away down the plughole she hears the voice. The voice tells her that she needs it. It wants to help her. Maggie recalls her first meeting with Barnabas. Only when she’s asleep does it make sense. She is unable to tell anyone, except to the voice. Dr. Julia Hoffman knows that her patient isn’t telling her everything; she lectures Maggie for not making greater progress. The voice observes how Dr. Hoffman’s attempting to learn Maggie’s secrets. As Dr. Hoffman hypnotizes Maggie, the voice pleads with her to fight it, but she is unable to resist. Maggie recalls to Dr. Hoffman about a time long ago when she was a little girl at the beach. Maggie can see the haunted house high above her atop of the cliffs, Collinwood. The voice tells her that that is place where the madness trapped her, where she found him again. She is unable to stop herself mentioning ‘The Sandman’ which sparks Dr. Hoffman’s curiosities. She feels compelled to write her name in the sand and then suddenly a word scratches itself into the sand beside it so that it now reads: : Hello Maggie Evans The voice repeats it. Maggie realizes she’s his now. She knows that if she tells Dr. Hoffman he’ll be angry, so she pushes the day she met The Sandman out of her mind Next morning, Dr. Hoffman is more determined than ever after learning of Maggie’s ‘childhood friend’. She informs her of how close Maggie has come to losing everything and that it is in Maggie's interests to cooperate. Dr. Hoffman observes that Maggie has used this ‘childhood friend’ to make a connection. The voice observes that he is far more than just an imaginary friend, vowing to show that fact to Julia soon. Maggie’s recalls a day when she was not allowed to play on the beach because it raining. She tries to tell her father about The Sandman, but he doesn’t believe her. She probably knew The Sandman wasn’t real, but that didn’t stop him whispering to her in the night: : Here comes the Sandman stepping so lightly, stealing along on the tips of his toes. And he scatters the sand with his outstretched hand into the eyes of the sleepy children. Go to sleep my children. Close your sleepy eyes, the lady moon is watching from out the darkening skies. And the little stars are peeping, to see if you are sleeping. Go to sleep my children. Go to sleep. Goodnight. At first The Sandman was just a shadow at the corner of Maggie’s vision and would vanish whenever she tried to look at him. She knew the voice was real, so she would talk to him for hours in the hope that he would trust her enough to let her see him. The Sandman watches Maggie playing alone by the shore, he wants to tell her his name but it is long since lost, he’s sure one day she’ll understand. Maggie senses him, first as an outline then solid enough to cast a shadow. She observes a tall, pale and thin man. The voice reveals that he’s only truly real during the night, during the moment she falls asleep. He observes that Maggie is different as she dreams all day long. Every night Maggie would dream of wonderful things, she wishes she could remember those dreams. The voice is glad that she won’t tell their secrets. Spring, Maggie’s no longer sure how long she’s been at Windcliff, she’s beginning to think that Dr. Hoffman with go to any lengths to get the answers she wants. Maggie is starting to think that she doesn’t have any answers to give her. The voice agrees. The voice asks her to tell him about Barnabas, she complies. The voice mentions Josette. Maggie has come to hate that name. She hears Josette’s music box playing. She pleads for it to stop. The voice tells her that as he has been transformed into something base and degenerate, that she too will change, into something even more pure and cherished than Josette. They will be reunited in death, death is waiting for her. Again, she pleads for it to stop. The music stops. Maggie remembers Bill Malloy walking his dog, Buster, along the sand. She liked Buster, but Buster didn’t like the Sandman. She’s sure that Buster could see something there that everyone else couldn’t, see him for what he was. On one occasion Buster growled a threat. In a second of fury The Sandman retorts at the dog, forcing the dog backwards landing in a broken heap. The Sandman smiles down at it. Dr. Hoffman thinks this to be a significant event, the conflict of a delusion to make sense of a traumatic event. For Maggie it was when she started to become afraid of The Sandman. The voice wants to know why Maggie’s so scared of him. She doesn’t trust him anymore. She wants him to go away. Maggie’s playing on the beach, she hasn’t seen The Sandman in days. She’s starting to miss him as there’s no one to talk too. Looking down at her feet she notices a dead hand. She can hear The Sandman laughing. He tells her that he is kind to all the children he looks after, he dresses them in clothes of sand. The person she found was a drowning victim. She knows that it was The Sandman’s doing, someone he’d dressed in clothes of sand as a warning letting Maggie know she’d rejected him. At night she hears his fingertips tapping on the window begging to be let in. His voice chants over and over: : The sandman is coming. Fall, Maggie’s mother has become weak, she doesn’t know if she’ll get better. She wonders if The Sandman’s the one making it happen, in order to punish her. Dr. Hoffman is concerned that they are not getting the result they require. She needs Maggie to move beyond the literal events to the deeper truth driving the memories. She declares The Sandman to be a construct, a way for Maggie to deal with her trauma. The voice declares Julia Hoffman is a construct, that Maggie has created Julia and Windcliffe as a way of suppressing some trauma. In Maggie’s dreams she’s a princess. She lives in castle far away in an exotic land. The sky is blue and the air is hot and wet with life. The mountain is alive with fire and the sea gleams on white sand. Dr. Hoffman thinks this to be a story Maggie read as a child. The voice tells Maggie she dreams of Josette’s world. The dreams making connections that she couldn’t. Maggie is distraught at the suggestion that she and Josette are one and same. The voice says that he could be Barnabas, he’s seen into his mind. He can help her. The voice goads her to run because The Sandman is coming to get her. A stormy night, Maggie is back in her room at Windcliffe. She realizes she is holding something, a brass key that fits the lock on her door. Using it she dashes out and down the corridor looking for an escape. She can hear hushed voices nearby, they know she’s got out. She reaches the front exit, it’s unlocked, she realizes that The Sandman has been thorough. As Dr. Hoffman calls out to Maggie she makes a run for it to the outside world. The voice instructs Maggie to go into the woods. She reachs the edge of a precipice, observing the water below violent and angry. She sees The Sandman becoming solid in the swirling rain barely a human shape stretching out to reach her. He’s brought her here just as he did before. On a night just like this one, Maggie was running along the beach screaming for The Sandman to leave her mother alone. That was the first time she heard Josette’s name. The Sandman urges Maggie to jump off the edge of the cliff, a moment of pain then it will all disappear. She hears people approaching, Dr. Hoffman’s voice desparatly calling out to her. Maggie decides to choose life and turns towards Dr. Hoffman. The Sandman begins to fade away his voice scattering in the wind. : The Sandman is coming he’s drifting so slightly, he’s stealing along on the tips of his toes. To scatter the sand with my own little hand in the eyes of sleeping children. Rest your wear eyes, Maggie Evans. The lady moon is watching down from the starry skies. Where the little stars are peeping, to see if you are sleeping. Go to sleep my child. Go to sleep. Goodnight. Theme Dramtis personae *Kathryn Leigh Scott as Maggie Evans *Alec Newman as The Sandman Memorable quotes Background information and notes *Maggie mentions that 3 months have passed from the time she first met Barnabas to when she was locked in his basement at the Old House. *Included at the end of this release is a trailer for The Ghost Watcher Bloopers and continuity errors The most glaring flaw occurs in the very beginning, where American character Maggie Evans narrates her drive home from Windcliff Sanitarium and uses the British word "windscreen" rather than the American word "windshield." Official Website *Big Finish Productions: Clothes of Sand Category:Big Finish Audio Dramas